JOHN:
"Quality is the primary empirical reality of the world" (Lila Ch 5) While
this seems to be essentially an assertion, the word empirical implies that
it
is to be supported by my experience. Pirsig's example of the hot stove
demonstrates an organismic reaction to quality, in the case of this example
a
low quality experience. What needs to be added to the core statement to
remove any possible ambiguity, then, is something of the nature of
"Organisms
experience quality (both positive and negative) as the primary empirical
reality of their world." As an organism, I can then test this statement
against my experience, and hopefully this 'reality' would also be supported
by Poincare's small child. It seems to me that some form of statement of
this
type is essential for the MOQ, yet by refining it as I have, it is saying
rather less than the original bold assertion. Yet critically, what it now is
saying is testable, whereas the more abstract statement from Pirsig is not.
ROGER:
Empiricism is basically a system of knowledge that stresses experience.
Quality is direct experience. Therefore "Quality is the primary empirical
reality of the world" is logically consistent within the metaphysics. To
quote W. James: "...there is only one primal stuff or material in our world,
a stuff which everything is composed , and if we call that stuff PURE
EXPERIENCE, then knowing can easily be explained ....."
Pirsig has chosen to call James' stuff VALUE or QUALITY. But they are
talking about the same stuff, and it is the primal or primary empirical
reality.
Avid:
I agree with Roger here totally, and I would like to add a few points.
1. As I already stated in a different post, you as experiencer, should also
be A RESULT of the experienced value/quality/moral experience we call an
encountered situation.Otherwise we are not talking MoQ. Not that you are
less real but that you have no knowledge of any.... including yourself,
unless by value/quality/moral experience.
2. Here RMP departs from Hume, who thinks that subjects form impressions
that we process. RMP says that our impressions are of quality, and of the
situation AS A WHOLE.
3. I think that it is not a coincidence [as John puts it] that RMP point to
a NEGATIVE quality example [the stove]. Here Popper comes to mind solving
Hume biggest problem: The problem of Induction.
In Popper's view to KNOW WHAT IS, is out of human [scientific] reach,
because we can only learn from PAST experience, and FUTURE experience can be
of a different kind, if we conclude about the future from the experiences of
the past, we make a grave mistake [this is the problem of Induction in a
nutshell]. Popper however says that this is true only of POSITIVE
STATEMENTS.
Negative statements, negated theories will be false for eternity. So Popper
shifts the stress of our scientific knowledge from the positive
[problematic] to the negative. This goes well with the inability to
formulate DQ, it goes well with RMP example of quality being a negative one,
AS A DELIBERATE CHOICE.
In Popper's view all positive theories are lucky guesses, as mutations are,
and should be treated with less identification with them.
"If you don't have at least two competing theories for a scientific problem,
it means you haven't understood the problem in hand"
[K. Popper]
and don't forget to be gentle
Avid
icq 6598359
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